State EPA wants rules to handle landfill fires

Saturday

Apr 30, 2011 at 12:01 AMApr 30, 2011 at 1:43 PM

Owners of new debris landfills would have to inspect their dumps every day for signs of fires and devise plans to extinguish them quickly under rules proposed by the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency.

Owners of new debris landfills would have to inspect their dumps every day for signs of fires and devise plans to extinguish them quickly under rules proposed by the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency.

The requirements are a response to a rash of underground fires that have occurred since 2009 at three of the state's 53 debris landfills. The landfills take discarded building materials from construction and demolition sites.

Ohio EPA officials also have drafted new prevention and extinguishing guidelines for the state's 41 municipal landfills that take garbage, two of which are battling underground fires.

"I think the primary

thing we are looking for is preparedness," said Linda Fee Oros, an Ohio EPA spokeswoman.

The fire at the 260-acre Countywide Recycling and Disposal landfill in Stark County began in 2006 when water mixed with tons of a metal waste called aluminum dross. The resulting chemical reaction created intense heat, smoke and odor problems, which continue today while the site still burns.

Such fires are rare and difficult to put out. They also can produce pollution, explosions, landslides and incredible heat that can melt buried pipes and plastic liners meant to shield groundwater from toxic waste.

For new debris landfills or older ones with plans to expand, the EPA's proposed rules would make owners check every day for signs of heat, steam or smoke. They also would be required to investigate and immediately report fires and to create "fire and explosion contingency plans."

Under the guidelines, municipal landfills would be urged to regularly examine gases produced by decaying garbage. High concentrations of carbon monoxide and temperatures above 131degrees are telltale signs of fire.

Environmental advocates support the changes. Richard Sahli, an environmental attorney and longtime critic of state landfill policies, said current state rules largely are silent regarding fires.

"There was one provision that if someone brought in a smoking load to the landfill it had to be set aside," Sahli said. "I think that was the only reference to flaming trash."

On the other side, municipal landfill operators don't support the proposed changes.

John Stacy, the Solid Waste Authority of Central Ohio's landfill and development director, said the guidelines mirror many of the precautions already in place to guard against fires at the Franklin County landfill.

Amanda Pratt, spokeswoman for Rumpke, said the company is still evaluating the proposed guidelines.

The company is monitoring a fire at its Rumpke Sanitary Landfill north of Cincinnati. It started in August 2009.

Temperatures within a 5-acre site inside the landfill's northeastern corner hover at about 190 degrees, Pratt said.

Michael Cyphert, attorney for the Construction and Demolition Association of Ohio, said the fire-safety requirements are unnecessary because fires are rare. Ohio EPA officials proposed the rules in January, days before Gov. John Kasich took office.

"It's overkill," Cyphert said.

State officials first became concerned about fires at debris landfills in 2000, when flames and clouds of hydrogen-sulfide gas emerged from the now-closed Warren Recycling landfill in Trumbull County.

EPA officials say underground fires detected in 2009 at the Exit C&D Landfill in Stark County and at A&L Salvage in Columbiana County are cooling and might be out soon. A fire at C&D Disposal Technologies in Jefferson County was extinguished in 2010.

shunt@dispatch.com

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